Haha, that sounds like a worthy goal! And if she's starting to get excited about the tank going in, that's all the better I think your little one will love it, too. Put the time-out spot by the tank once it's all set up! Whenever my brothers and I threw tantrums, mom would sit us by the tank and make us look at it. Not even two minutes, we were calmed down and entertained by watching the fish. I think it was rather genius on her part.

__________________

"Aquariums are like science, art, and hypno-therapy, all rolled into one," I insisted.
"You're not putting a hundred gallon tank in the living room," my roommate replied.

tank is being picked up tomorrow AM, so expect some pictures of it in place of the 90 (then removed for safe keeping. Stairs aren't built yet, as of this second, so the section above the tank will be built this weekend. Once the drywall is in place and prepped for painting the tank will be put back for good and I can start laying out the filtration while we finish up the rest of the basement.

I've also been doing some research into kribensis as i've decided to look for keeping pairs of different varieties. During this research I've figured that the kribensis, at least the male, I have is not of the more common pulcher species of the pelvicachromis but is a member of the sacrimontis species. Which, really, just means he'll end up an inch or two larger than a common male krib.

nice little pic of the family sitting on our new wall haha. Father in law, who is really the brains behind the carpentry work, lifting the tank into place. Without him I don't know how this would've gotten together.

And finally a good corner shot of it in place.

We've got hot and cold water ran as well. another big thank you to my FIL for that. He jokes that he's my helper, but I'm really his. we've pretty much told him what we wanted and he figured out how to do it. I cut, hammered, and lent some thoughts as well.

We need to pull the tank off and the plywood again. Turns out the center is higher than the sides and we need to take a belt sander to the 2x4 to flatten it out. not a big deal, but it would be if we put water in the tank!

We're not 100% square, but we'll be fine once the drywall and trim go up.

From here on out I don't know if I'll have updates until the drywall is up, spackled, and ready for paint. Once that happens the tank will be put in place for good, the trim added, which will overlap the tank trim just a tad. Once all that is done then it'll be time to work on the tank's plumbing and as soon as that is done I'll be filling and testing that whole system.

I fully expect the basement to be complete within the next 2 months. I'd really like to see the basement finished by my 30th birthday this coming april; though, i don't feel like the tank will be ready. I have some hardscape layouts in my head I'll start to sketch in the mean time.

rock on! The cold water has been finished. (please tilt your head for the picture, sorry) We were short 6" of copper to finish the hot water. We also had a split in the 2x4" used to mount the spigots, so the clamps are being utilized for gluing the wood back together.

With the cold water ran, I decided to test fill the tank. Which is fun when the filtration is not set up and you have holes in the overflow! so I had to keep a close eye on it when it got near the overflow

oh, and in typical cat fashion, my cat had to check things out prior to the water going in.

I have a picture on the camera (these are S3 pictures) of how we leveled the tank/stand. Once we got the tank on we knew there was an issue... there was maybe 1/8" space on either side of the tank, so you could rock it on the center. that was noooo good. We pondered what to do for a bit. ultimately, we used wooden shims to move the plywood up to meet the tank and generously filled the gap between the plywood and 2x4 with liquid nails. There is a shim maybe every inch or two with liquid nails pushed in with the shims both inside and out.

I was a little concerned with how things would settle once the tank was full, but at this point there has not been any movement what so ever.

Next step is to purchase two bulkhead kits and a 37g for the sump, along with a DC5000 pump. I'm looking forward to get cracking on the filtration so I can see this thing 100% full and running.

this coming weekend our new basement steps are going in, and potentially seeing the rest of the framework done as well. After that happens we're dry walling and prepping for paint. Once the prep work is done I can seriously consider beginning to set the tank up.

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